Taking stock of the West Bengal floods, which was caused due to the release of excess water from Damodar Valley Corporation (DVC) dam, Prime Minister Narendra Modi spoke to West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Wednesday and assured to provide all possible help from Centre to alleviate the flood situation.
During the phone call, Banerjee complained that excess release of water from DVC led to man-made floods in Bengal.
In a press statement, the West Bengal chief minister said the excess release of water from DVC dams has led to man-made floods in Bengal year after year.
Banerjee said despite raising issues to PM Modi and DVC in 2015, the works of renovation, upgradation and modernisation and regarding increasing the water holding capacity of the DVC dam by around 1.2 lakh acre-feet was never addressed.
The chief minister said she had requested to carry out de-siltation of Panchet dam, constructing a ring embankment on Maithon dam, clearing of 18,000 check dams constructed by DVC for preventing silt to carry over to the dam or rivers and constructing 6th dam at Balpahari in Jharkhand.
She further said after several follow-ups by the state chief secretary, no concrete measures were taken to address the issue.
As a part of mitigation measures, Banerjee said there is an urgent need for building a holistic regional plan for upgradation and operation of these dams.
Release of excess water from DVC caused floods in Midnapore districts, Howrah and Hooghly.
Banerjee had scheduled to conduct an aerial survey of the affected region but cancelled the event due to bad weather. She went to Howrah by road and visited Amta, which has been submerged.
( With inputs from ANI )
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